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How are you making a jump from “people can decide to bulldoze the houses they own” to “people can bulldoze the houses that I own”?
Yes eminent domain is awful. Down with eminent domain.
Because you are stopping them doing what they want with their houses? Assuming you have the majority and you don't want them to bulldoze the house on their land and replace it with a condo right? You are exerting control over what they can do on their land. That was what the whole issue was, they want to bulldoze the land they own and build a condo, and you (and your coalition) won't let them.
So let's say they get control and rezone the area such that single family homes are now disallowed and tell you, you must bulldoze your house and build a condo. Now they are exerting the same control over yours (skip eminent domain if you like, the same effect can be had through rezoning). Presumably you also accept this as ok?
I’m not going to keep explaining this over and over. I think you understand my (relatively simple) point, and at this stage are just trolling.
If you own a house: it’s your house. You can collectively organize with your neighbors to protect your interests and do things like prevent zoning changes. You, as a resident, have more rights over what happens with the neighborhood than non residents.
No this doesn’t mean people can bulldoze your house. It means that if they become residents, and want to petition the city to allow them to build a condo complex on land then own then they are free to do so. If the other residents don’t want them to, then the likelihood of this succeeding is low.
You’re getting into pretty basic “active vs passive” actions type of philosophy/ethics questions here.
It’s perfectly acceptable, at least in the dominant moral structure of the west, where we both presumably life, to say: you cannot shoot somebody. Shooting people is illegal (aside from edge cases like self defense).
However we don’t have laws like: it is illegal not to prevent somebody from being shot. If I see somebody about to get shot, and can’t prevent it, we see this as different than if I had shot them myself.
Similarly: we can pass laws that say “you can’t build that here”, but don’t pass laws (generally) that say: “you must [un]build this here”.
Laws can prevent you from doing something. They can’t ([1]generally) compel you to do something.
There are obviously some exceptions to this. Taxes, the draft, child support are a few.
There are some very rare cases of “condemning” a building and forcing its destruction. Is that what you mean? Do you imagine that a property developer should be able to come to a neighborhood and force the condemnation of some of the homes of people living there so they can be bulldozed? (I doubt this is what you’re saying)
My entire point is this action vs inaction thing is often a made up distinction. People are forced to tear down things they have built all the time. Don't get planning permissions for your extension you can be forced to tear it down. Logically there is no real difference between you telling someone they cannot build X on their land and them being forced to tear it down if they build it anyway. Anything that you want someone to do through zoning et al, is backed by the threat of violence and destruction. You pointed out a whole bunch of other examples where people are indeed forced to do something by law. Wearing seatbelts, having insurance if you want to drive, submitting to lawful arrest, on and on and on.
I'm not saying you should be forced to tear down your house, I am simply pointing out that if you demand a say over what people can build (and therefore what will be torn down if they are in violation) then the only thing stopping them doing the same to you is support. This is essentially the Libertarian argument, that people should be able to build what they want on land they own. But if you demand a say in what can be built on others land, then you are also opening up yourself for others to be able to regulate what you do.
And just to clarify, I think this is fine, I think that is how society works, interlocking rings of having to submit to others will even on your own land. My point is that once you have accepted that (as you appear to have, and I have!) then trying to say "It only applies to people building X, not demanding we tear down Y" is logically incoherent because limiting people to building X must have an enforcement mechanism of tearing down Y if they build it anyway. And once that is accepted, logically it should also apply where zoning is changed or the government as the will of the people decide they want a railway to go through your house and force you to sell it. Because you have already admitted that the people who live there are allowed to set exactly what you can and cannot do with your land despite the fact it is privately owned.
Either your land is inviolate or it is not. If it isn't then you must submit to the will of the people. And given you want others to submit to the will of the people and not build a condo next door, you do not have a logical leg to stand on if your home was rezoned or it was decided it to be more important for some other use. If you think it is ok for you and 499 neighbors to not allow a condo to be built next door, then it is also ok if 500 of your neighbors decide they want a railway station where your house is. Sure they should compensate you, but the will of the people has spoken. A halfway house that allows you to demand a condo be torn down, but does not allow others to demand your house to be torn down is the essence of NIMBYISM.
Either accept your principles or admit is is simply self-interest. Which again is fine. It is perfectly permissible to want laws that that benefit you! I do! But I must also then admit it is ok for others to want laws that favor them, for no other reason.
It is absolutely self interest. I believe I said this in the very first post I made.
People should be allowed to advocate for their interests. This means individuals, neighborhoods, towns, states, and countries.
We have different definitions of coherence. You even made the point here. The people being forced to tear something down that was built illegally is different than changing the laws, then forcing them to tear down something which was legal.
Can you find any examples of what you’re describing? A law changes and then homeowners had to tear down their (previously legal) homes?
There are many, many, many routine cases of people being fined for building illegal structures, while I’m sure there are some examples of buildings that escaped a grandfather clause, I suspect that they are extremely rare.
I have searched and found no examples of what you’re describing, but of course many many many many examples which follow the logic im laying out here.
This is irrelevant. My whole point is not about what actually happens, but what the logical consequences of the belief set you laid out are. If your argument is just self-interest then you don't need all the other justifications about the differences between building and tearing down etc.
I'm not critiquing your belief set, I think that is entirely justifiable. I'm pointing out that the arguments you made for your specific situation also justify other things which you didn't support. Therefore your beliefs are not derived from the arguments you made. So you can skip all those in future and just say, I believe X should be allowed and not Y because of self interest as a home-owner/resident.
And of course a condo developer can also say I believe Y should be allowed because of self-interest as a condo developer.
I’m saying that there is an obvious logical difference between compelling and prohibiting an action. This isn’t just me saying this; I’m asking you to cite some examples because it is also appears to be a standard by which laws are written.
My beliefs are derived from both a naked, immediate self interest in securing a safe and happy existence for my family, and also an interest in there being a reasonable, logical set of rules for a society to follow that exist in such a way that they are understood even if they have not all been individually read. The term for this, which you already pointed out, is coherence. A specially carved out law which would allow property developers to bulldoze my house so they can build condos is incoherent. No reasonable person could intuit this from an existing set of understandings about laws. It’s also stupid, and would have obvious destabilizing effects on society. The idea of individual property rights is, and I hate to keep using this term, but foundational. You own your property. there are laws which can restrict your use of the property, but not generally laws which compel use of the property.
If you want to build condos next to my house, me and the other homeowners can petition the government to restrict that use, but it only goes one way. The property developers cannot petition the government (generally) to compel me to bulldoze my house.
They absolutely can. The fact they don't usually is not the same thing as can't. Railroads are often developed by private companies and the government will use eminent domain when necessary. The reason it is not done more is because it is unpopular, not because it can't be done. Also for electric companies. I'm not saying this is popular or used often (you can see from examples below it is often opposed by local people), because it isn't, but the use derives from the same principles about people and governments being able to control what land can be used for that you are in favor of. To be clear once more, I am not arguing about what does happen often, more how your justifications also justify your neighbors or government bulldozing your land if they felt it was necessary. Just as they prevent a developer building a condo when they think it is necessary.
https://apnews.com/article/eminent-domain-columbia-michael-brown-legislation-bills-60f6059347548fa3dbb4a544e7d8a30c
https://www.usnews.com/news/business/articles/2023-11-27/georgia-case-over-railroads-use-of-eminent-domain-could-have-property-law-implications
"In the past, the “public use” provision of eminent domain law has been used for things like roads, schools, parks, and other public facilities that could be accessed by all in the community. In recent years, the meaning of “public use” has been interpreted more loosely. In the controversial case of Kelo v. City of New London, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of New London and decided that the city could take private property and give it to another private entity for “economic development.” However, despite spending millions of taxpayer dollars on the project’s proposal, nothing was ever constructed.
Now, oil and gas companies have this card to play when justifying land grabs. As suggested by a University of Minnesota Law professor, “in many natural resource–rich areas of the country… the knock on the door is less likely to come from a government official and much more likely to come from a mining, oil, or gas company representative.”"
I understand the point you’re trying to make, I just don’t agree with it.
If you want to live in some absolutely free of any regulations whatsoever place, then I also encourage you to move somewhere and create that place. My suspicion is that it will look more like Dharavi slum than San Francisco circa 2005, but I still encourage you or anybody else to try it.
My neighborhood, enacting the policies you don’t like, has been successful. People want to live here, and the success of the policies we have enacted is, I suspect, the thing attracting you to it.
What I’m asking is that if you want to try this new plan, just go do it somewhere else. There is TONS of land in this country which is empty. Go build your utopia!
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